


Meno Mosso

by Tseecka



Category: Sherlock Holmes (Downey films)
Genre: Fluff, M/M, Separation, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-06-24
Updated: 2014-06-24
Packaged: 2018-02-06 02:46:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,433
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1841440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tseecka/pseuds/Tseecka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Holmes finds a new way to deal with the stagnation of abandonment, and Watson learns just what he means to Holmes.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Meno Mosso

It's been three months since Watson left, gallivanting off on his domestic adventure with Miss Mary Morstan with barely a tip of his immaculately brushed hat to his flatmate, and Holmes is struck yet again by the sheer size of their suddenly empty rooms. He still hasn't managed to break himself of the plural, and everything around him strikes him as "theirs". His and Watson's despite the fact the ignorant, impudent sop decided domesticity and bouncing babes and a tedious medical practice were more to his liking than adventures of the active mind, the puzzling of clues and motive and the occasional chance to fire his seldom-used service revolver.   
  
The gun still sits in his dressing-table; Watson left it, as a token, and a hope that maybe Holmes would manage to keep one on his person at all times if he had two to choose from. A theory which has never been tested, because Holmes has barely left the second floor in those three months.   
  
The smell from his miniature laboratory is starting to garner complaints from the neighbours, and Mrs. Hudson has been after him to change his habits. But they've already forbidden him from his violin at three in the morning, and he refuses to take the Moroccan case from its drawer because it feels just wrong--like sneaking a candy when one's mother's back is turned--and he has the constant suspicion that the good doctor would manage to burst straight through that door the minute the syringe touched his arm. It's entirely illogical but the hairs at the back of his neck convince him otherwise, and he chooses instead to employ his mind with the experiments that cause Baker Street such concern.   
  
But the rooms are still large, and empty, and he still misses the familiar presence of Watson and his foolscap over his shoulder, seated in the plush armchair by the window, puffing leisurely at his pipe of herbal tobacco. Comforting and familiar, indeed.  
  
The rooms feel very large, and that armchair very empty. And the heavy feeling of Watson's absence is what prompts Holmes to push the chemistry set out of the window one foggy London morning before slamming said window shut and refusing any human interaction for the next three days. Until his mind begins to stagnate, and one morning--both the violin and the case tempting him tremendously with their promises of coherence--he throws on his bowler and muffler, shrugs on his woolen coat, and sets to London's streets.   
  
He returns to their empty rooms, now three sizes too big, with a receipt of sale in his hand and an appointment for the following Thursday.   
  
The following Thursday, Mrs. Hudson returns from her afternoon social to find deep gouges running up the length of her wall, and half the door frame to her let rooms splintered. She considers running upstairs to check on Mr. Holmes, but there is a distinct lack of the smell of gunpowder, and his trigger-happy finger wouldn't have hesitated at a chance to try out his new muffling device (he's made improvements, he assures her, though she is in no way reassured by his claims) on a well-deserving ruffian.   
  
At 10 o'clock at night, someone begins playing a piano.   
  
It sounds distinctly as though it is coming from her--Mrs. Hudson can't quite bring herself to stop calling them "her" rooms, because they are, and are only let out on rare or special occasions, and no one is special if not Mr. Holmes--upstairs rooms. The gouges on the walls worry her a little more at the sound, but she dismisses the perfect playing as a phonograph and continues her knitting. The piano continues until late in the night, and picks up again at 7 o'clock the next morning. No one complains, so she doesn't.   
  
Mr. Holmes, she decides, is rather the accomplished pianist.   
  


* * *

  
It's been five months since Watson left Holmes alone in his rooms--he's made it to the singular now, you see, though it still requires conscious effort and he's not always successful--when a lone man with a slight limp makes his way up the steps to 221B Baker Street. His hand hovers over the knocker, before he shrugs and pushes the door in anyways, closing it quietly behind him. There is no Mrs. Hudson running to the door--she must be out, at an afternoon social. He's come at her request to check on Holmes, who seemed to enjoy locking himself in his own rooms and, she seems sure, catching pigeons from his windowsill which he then roasts on the fireplace. He'll take no visitors nor clients, she tells him, and please Doctor won't you come check on him?   
  
He notices the gouges in the wall--years with a man like Holmes can change your perception of the minute details, he thinks ruefully--as he makes his way up the stairs. He also hears the strains of music wafting from behind the closed door. As natural as breathing he forces it open, swinging it into the parlour of the rooms beyond.   
  
Delicate hands, with long spidery fingers, dance over the ivory keys of a piano that has somehow taken up residence in the middle of their rooms--and he's tried so hard to fight against it, but this sight, of Holmes and the carpet and the plush armchair and now, suddenly, a piano--well, it all comes rushing back, and this is home again. Holmes is seated at this piano, his eyes shut tight and his body swaying to and fro. With the music, Watson thinks, and sidles his way around the instrument. It almost touches the wall for a good number of feet in one or two spots.   
  
A floorboard creaks, and Holmes stops playing, his eyes flashing up to where Watson is frozen, caught in the act. He shifts awkwardly, wants to make it appear a natural pause in his circumambulation, but Holmes notices the tilt of his leg and the unreleased muscle of his instep and just shakes his head. He begins to play again, and Watson thinks maybe it sounds familiar. The melody is soft and sweet and slow, a little bittersweet maybe, with a touch of longing and just the slightest dash of remorse. Watson continues around the piano, comes to a stop next to the bench, and Holmes slides over just enough for them to both sit in relative comfort on the stool. In silence, Watson watches Holmes long violinist fingers dance over the keys.   
  
Funny how he never imagined Holmes playing the piano, he thinks. He has the hands for it. The fingers for the violin strings, but the reach for the octave, effortlessly coaxing chords out into the open. He closes his eyes, and pictures a stage, and the song becomes suddenly familiar, a perfect image in his mind's eye.   
  
His lips move in the words of the aria, the last opera they'd ever seen together, and without realizing it his head is suddenly on Holmes' shoulder. Holmes leans back into him, a reassuring pressure, a silent thanks mixed with just a hint of possession,   
  


* * *

  
Watson has always marveled at the way in which his head fits so perfectly into the little nook between the lobe of Holmes' ear and the edged blade of his collarbone. He breathes in Holmes' scent, relishes the strength of wiry muscles hidden under loose dressing gowns and tailored jackets; his heart jumps just a bit when Holmes shifts again, and he feels lips pressing against the top of his head, even as the music plays on. And he finds himself singing, the soprano melody transposed to his own baritone, and Holmes' tenor joins him; singing just softly, just loud enough for the other to hear, and Watson realizes only by its absence that his friend is no longer trembling. He glances over to those ghost-white wrists, markedly free of the evidence of the dreaded habit, then up at Holmes face. He is transported, in the world of morphine and of cocaine, but his body is free of the signs and symptoms and Watson can't imagine why he hadn't considered this therapy before.   
  
It is then that he notices the small "JW" carved by a steady, practiced hand into the ivory of the middle C, and his heart leaps to his throat. He finds he must close his eyes again and listen to the sound of himself filling the empty hole he made, suddenly more aware than ever before of just where it is he belongs, and wonders what he'll tell Mary. 


End file.
